Volunteering

Why Volunteer for The Nelson Trust?

If you feel able to contribute some of your free time to help our clients on the road to recovery, you will find this an incredibly rewarding experience. The lives of individuals and families are transformed here, and it is a privilege to play a part in that. Our literacy volunteer Jill says that this is the most satisfying teaching she has done in her career. Here she talks about how she became involved in this invaluable role.

What would I be doing?

Every volunteer has something unique to offer us – skills, energy and life experiences which they can bring to the Nelson Trust to support and develop the services we provide.

If you are interested in volunteering for the Nelson Trust there are a wide range of possible roles for you, at our treatment and training centres in Brimscombe, our ISIS Women’s Centre in either Swindon or Gloucester, or our Family Focus services in Gloucester. Whether your interests are in helping us with our fundraising work or getting involved in our day-to-day services we would love to talk to you about what our needs are and what you have to offer.

Currently we have volunteers in a range of roles. The following are just some examples:

One-to-one literacy work with clients, helping them to improve their spelling and writing

Supporting tutors to run classes and courses in a variety of subject areas from arts and crafts to computing, bike maintenance, woodwork and wellbeing

Cooking for our lunch club at ISIS Women’s Centre

Helping our Fund Raising team to organise events (click here for more details)

A range of interesting administration roles (click here for more details)

Assisting our clients on their activity days.

Volunteer Placements to assist in college courses being undertaken

Client Mentoring

In return for giving your time, we will aim to offer you all the support and training that you need to feel confident and effective in your chosen role, and if we can help you with your personal and professional development goals we will. We provide regular, structured supervision and a team leader will be assigned to support you in your work.

If I have had problems with drugs or alcohol in the past can I still volunteer?

Yes – we would very much value your help and expertise. As you will appreciate, we work with people at a time when they are dealing with complex problems and they can be very vulnerable. For this reason we need to carry out an enhanced Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) check (formerly known as Criminal Records Bureau (CRB)) check before you can begin volunteering. However, if you do have any previous convictions, this does not mean that you cannot volunteer with us, so please talk in confidence to a member of the team if you are worried about this.

It is also part of our Volunteering Policy that if you are currently or have recently been a client of Nelson Trust services we would like you to be clean for a reasonable time from any substances and not currently attending any of the Trusts’ services before you join us in a volunteering role.

What do I do next?

Please call us 01453 885633 and ask to speak to our Volunteer Coordinator for further information. We will arrange to meet with you to talk about your application.